I’ve been having trouble finding engineering schools that can be considered a safety. I’m from VA and my budget is at maximum 45k per year. My GPA is 90.21 ( my school does not weight, and this is with a rigorous course load, for some context). My SAT is 1440, but I am taking it again on Saturday and I am expecting my score to increase.
I am open to all sorts of schools, but my only requirement is that it is not an engineering only school, as I hope to minor in other subjects.
Schools I will potentially apply to:
Boston U
Case Western Reserve University
Carnegie Mellon
Lehigh
Penn State
Purdue
U Pitt
Tulane
UVA
Virginia Tech
Georgia Tech
Northeastern
Yes, of course engineering safeties exist! You just need to expand where you would be willing to go. A number of places automatically admit based on stats. Check the threads on that topic at the top of the Parents Forum (auto admits) and Financial Aid Forum (auto admits with guaranteed merit scholarships). And of course you always have the option of starting at a community college that has a guaranteed transfer (articulation agreement) with a 4-year institution for engineering.
Look in to Valparaiso, Marquette, UDayton, and UCincinnati. These are less competitive admits for engineering and you may even qualify for some merit. All have ABET accredited engineering.
If I’m not mistaken, there are engineering programs at several universities in Virginia that are less selective than UVa or Virginia Tech. VCU? George Mason? ODU? JMU? Do any of these schools have the programs you want?
I know you said you don’t want an engineering only school, but minors are overrated. You could look at places like MSOE. It looked like you would qualify for enough merit to get your total cost below $45k. I had to guess what your GPA is on a 4.0 scale. A place like Miami University (OH) may be close. But once again I don’t know what your 90.21 is in 4.0. Realistically, I think your best shots are in state. Your list looks really reachy. To get the cost down to 45k for any OSS(flagship level)/private, you are going to need merit aid. That is going to be difficult with your GPA.
Alfred, Catholic, College of New Jersey, Gannon, Uni of Hartford, Fairfield, Hofstra, Loyola MD, UMaine, Manhattan, Merrimack, Uni of New Haven, Western New England
University at Buffalo, even OOS would be below your budget. That is probably a safety for both finances and admissions.
RIT may or may not fit. If you run the NPC, you will see if it falls in your budget. Whether it would be a safety for admissions may depend on which engineering major you were applying for. I think some are a bit more competitive than others.
“happymomof1” has brought up an issue which does not seem to get a lot of attention. There are some very fine engineering schools with articulation agreements with community colleges, but look into the details of the articulation programs. The specifics of these agreements are important as demonstrated in the Virginia Tech agreement which only guarantees admission with the 3.2 GPA to the general engineering curriculum while other majors are conditioned on available space. You can read the Virginia Tech articulation agreement at https://vt.edu/admissions/transfer/agreements.html
ABET accredited programs are highly recommended for employment and graduate school placement. ABET rules do not forbid non engineering minors. However, when I look through the Virginia Tech website I could not find discussion of non-engineering minors for their engineering majors. You might call their admissions office and ask direct questions.
If the program fits your academics goals, you will save money and it would be a work-around the admissions issue. It is not as straight forward as it would seem.
I did not know that George Mason had an engineering program so I went to the ABET website to learn more. They do have some ABET accredited programs, but are missing some important majors such as Mechanical Engineering (ME). See http://main.abet.org/aps/AccreditedProgramsDetails.aspx?OrganizationID=383&ProgramIDs=. You may check for other ABET programs as the same site.
Clarkson has engineering depth and a well established reputation. It has a 640 acre campus. Rural is out of fashion right now. They have merit awards. It is my favorite quality backup. See https://www.clarkson.edu/ You can look at possible minors @ https://www.clarkson.edu/undergraduate/minors. This includes humanities minors which would fit into your ABET accredited engineering program. They have a 640 acre campus and rural is not in fashion now. If not yet, you will become a hockey fan.
Given your interest in a broad engineering program with a variety of none engineering minors I was surprised that my University was not on your list. Admission has become difficult, but so are the others listed. Do you have demonstrated financial need? The average GPA of entering freshman in 2017 was 3.86. I would say that 90.21 is not out of the mix but merit money would not be likely. They do a pretty good job of meeting need. WPI and Brown probably have the most flexible ABET programs going. Interdisciplinary thinking is strongly encouraged. On the engineering side, WPI has the depth.
“I am open to all sorts of schools, but my only requirement is that it is not an engineering only school, as I hope to minor in other subjects.”
Ok, but then you have GT and VT as schools you’re considering and those are tech schools. As others have said, a lot depends on what you want to minor in. If you want to minor in business or a science that’s one thing, if you want to minor in a foreign language say, then you’d be better off at CMU, UVA.
Also engineering safety schools almost by definition, would be the less selective, public or private schools in state, as tk21769 points out. When I was applying, PSU and Rutgers would have been safeties for you, but those were the good ole days, and you don’t want to assume that now.
^ no offense but VPISU now renamed to VT in the 90’s is not an “tech” school.
GT is 78% STEM
VT is 38% STEM
If you want to call VT a “tech” school you might as well call UC Berkeley, NC State, Maryland, UWashington, UTexas, UCSD, Houston, CMU, BYU, Oregon State, UC Davis, USF, Purdue, UC Irvine, Arizona State, Lehigh, Columbia, Drexel, Cornell, Penn State, LSU, Iowa State, Minnesota, Rice, Duke, UFlorida and many others… “tech schools”. Because they have a greater or just as high STEM percentage as VT.
VT is a comprehensive rural state university like Texas A&M or Iowa State. Which all have 100+ degree offerings.
GT is not a comprehensive university and has < 50 undergrad degrees.
When my daughter was considering Engineering we learned UW (Wisconsin) Platteville not only is accredited but you don’t apply to the engineering program, just declare it as a major. It is also the only school we have toured that includes books in the tuition.
)